The influence of diabetic regulation on the diurnal variation in blood and the urinary excretion of ketone bodies. Studies in newly diagnosed diabetics.

A typical diurnal variation of blood ketone bodies (acetacetate+3-hydroxybutyrate) has been found in 23 newly diagnosed, untreated diabetics regardless of diabetic type. It was characterized by high morning concentrations, followed by a fall, and later on a rise in concentration during the evening and night. Satisfactory diabetic regulation, judged from glucose measurements, did not change this diabetic pattern, which differed fundamentally from the normal diurnal variation. In the regulated state the morning concentration of ketone bodies in blood was still abnormally high in the juvenile and the non-obese maturity onset diabetics, while the concentration in the phenformin-treated diabetics had increased on each sampling time. The 24-hour urinary excretion of ketone bodies also remained abnormally high in the phenformin-treated patients.